


Faded

by lord_of_the_phantom



Category: Le Fantôme de l'Opéra | Phantom of the Opera & Related Fandoms, Phantom of the Opera - Lloyd Webber
Genre: AU, Color, F/M, Fluffy, Soulmate AU, cuteness, fluffy yet angsty, idk what's really going on, no idea what the time period is
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-17
Updated: 2018-11-20
Packaged: 2019-08-24 23:42:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16650127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lord_of_the_phantom/pseuds/lord_of_the_phantom
Summary: Christine’s world blossomed into color the minute she touched Erik’s hand, but she made the fatal mistake of thinking that the burst of blues, purples, and reds that suddenly graced her world were a delayed reaction to her childhood friend Raoul touching her shoulder only minutes before. She lived under that delusion for years and years as the colors slowly became less vibrant, and now she lives in a world of black and white, trapped searching for the happiness and colors she used to know.





	1. Chapter 1

Christine marveled at the new world around her as it exploded into vibrant color the instant she took the man’s—no, her angel’s—hand. She grinned, unable to contain her joy at seeing the colors she’d dreamed of for so long. She knew that this was an aftereffect of Raoul laying his hand on her shoulder only minutes before, since her dear Madame Giry had told her that there was almost always a delay from when your soulmate touches you before you see the colors. “That’s how it was for Meg’s father and me. I didn’t see the colors until ten minutes after he first took my hand,” she said one day years ago when a young, curious Christine had asked her how the world worked. “And the colors stay vibrant as long as you’re near your soulmate.” Little Christine had smiled up at her foster mother, wondering when she’d see the colors.  
And now she did. She couldn’t wait to tell Raoul that she could see the things she’d only read in books or been told by Madame Giry. The burgundy walls of her dressing room. The white of the mask of her Angel of Music, which she was staring at.   
As her Angel of Music led her down to his home, she stared at the different shades of gray and brown that laid on the wall. And then they reached it. The lake. It shimmered with the blues she only dreamed about, just as she’d always been promised it did.  
Christine spent most of her time marveling at the colors until the night of Il Muto, when she ran to the rooftop with her Raoul after the death of Joseph Buquet. She dashed up to him, her breath visible in the cold night air, and beamed up at him, leaning against his chest. “Do you see them to0?” she asked, her eyes sparkling with love and hope and amazement.   
“Yes!” he said, taking her into his arms and kissing her, lifting her and spinning her around as he did. She relished in his kiss, in love with the feeling of being in love and being loved in return, a feeling which she hadn’t felt since her father died years ago. Sure, she had her Madame Giry, but she always preferred her Meg over Christine, as could be expected since Meg was her biological daughter.   
“The world is so beautiful now that I can see you in full color. Marry me, Christine. You’re my soulmate. How else would you explain the colors bursting through my vision? Clearly, you’re my soulmate, and I am yours. Marry me, please, once this whole ordeal with your so-called Phantom has ended.”   
Christine nodded, breathless from the sudden proposal and from the cold. Raoul beamed at her, kissing her again.   
Little did she know that in the shadows, a man who had seen color for the first time upon taking Christine’s hand was sitting, mourning the loss of the woman who was his soulmate, the woman who had made a mistake.  
After the whole experience with the Phantom, which I’m sure you all know the story of by now, Christine and Raoul were married. By this time, since Christine had only been out of touch with the source of her color for a few days, the colors had not yet started to fade, and everything was still a false perfection.   
However, after she moved in with Raoul, Christine noticed that the bright colors she had seen only days before seemed…dimmer. “No worries,” she said to herself, trying to convince herself that everything was fine. “No worries at all. I’ve just gotten used to them and they don’t seem as bright that’s all.”  
Although, she didn’t really believe these words herself.   
Raoul and the Phantom, who many know as Erik, were also losing their sight of the colors they had grown so fond of. Erik was losing them because he was away from Christine, which was no surprise to him. He knew he’d have to return to black and white after she left him for that Raoul. He just would hold onto the colors while they lasted.  
Raoul, on the other hand, didn’t understand why his colors were fading away. However, what he did not know was that he had brushed shoulders with a young woman in the lobby of the opera house just after leaving Christine’s dressing room, and like Christine, he convinced himself that the colors he saw were a delayed reaction to touching Christine’s shoulder.   
During this ten-year time during which their worlds faded back to dreary shades of gray and their happiness left with it, Christine and Raoul had two little girls, Celesta and Madrigal. They had hoped that this would rekindle their love, and with it, reignite the colors in their vision, but it never did.   
And Christine, as she sat in the world of black and white, found herself wondering if she’d ever see the wonderful colors she’d so adored ever again.


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Raoul finds out that who he believed was his soulmate isn't truly his soulmate.

Raoul sprinted into the living room, breathless. “Christine!” he gasped. Christine shared a glance with her little girls, Celesta and Madrigal, then looked up at him, prompting him to continue. “I’ve found her! I’ve really, finally found her!”   
Christine stood up from her armchair and walked over to him, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Who is this ‘her’ you speak of, darling?” she asked, smiling. He brushed a strand of her brown hair behind her ear, then picked her up and twirled her around, beaming. Her heart sunk. That used to be the smile reserved for when he saw her. The last time he’d grinned like that was at her wedding, and he hadn’t twirled her around like that since then either. Something had gone horribly wrong.   
“Her name’s Mariette DuPont. She’s so amazing, Christine!” Raoul said, the smile not leaving his face. Christine’s heart sank. This was not good.  
However, she was a decent actress, and she feigned excitement, not wanting to let her veneer down in front of her little girls. They couldn’t see her weak. Christine laughed, hoping nobody else could tell how forced it sounded. “Elaborate? What makes her so amazing? Did you meet her at work, or did you run into her on the street, or what?”  
“Yeah, what?” Celesta asked. Christine grinned at her daughter and picked her up. Celesta smiled and threw her arms around her mother’s neck.   
Raoul froze for a minute, likely debating how best to express his love for his Mariette. Christine looked at him. “Come on, Raoul! You can’t keep Celie and Maddie waiting for too long, can you?” Raoul shook his head, still unable to put enough words together to form a sentence. “I didn’t think so. Now, go ahead and just tell us already!”  
“Well, her name’s Mariette,” Raoul began.   
Madrigal giggled. “Daddy, you said that already,” she said, pouting. “We want more information!”   
Raoul smiled down at her, and she extended her arms, waiting to be lifted. He happily obliged, picking her up and kissing her forehead. “I suppose I did, didn’t I?” Madrigal nodded. He ruffled his younger daughter’s hair. “Anyway, I brushed past her on the street. It was nothing major, just my shoulder brushing against hers. But the moment I did, the world around me burst into color! I could see the green on the trees and the blue of the sky again.” He twirled Maddie around the way he used to twirl his wife. “We then went out to lunch, and I found out that she could see the colors too. we have so much in common. She is truly my soulmate.”   
Christine bit her lip and looked up at him through her long lashes. “What does that mean for me?” she asked.   
He shook his head. “We part as friends, with joint custody of Maddie and Celie. You’ll have them most of the time, as their mother, though I would really like to see them on weekends. After all, they are still my daughters.”   
Christine leaned forward, blinking rapidly. What did he mean, ‘we part as friends?’ He couldn’t leave her. Not like this. There was all kinds of legal work involved in getting a divorce, not to mention what would happen to little Celesta and Madrigal. They’d grow up transferring between houses, never feeling like they had one singular home. Didn’t they deserve to live with both of their parents all the time?  
Moreover, why didn’t Raoul consider this before he decided to run off with that Mariette of his?  
“Raoul, what about all the legal work? Aren’t there all kinds of things that have to happen for us to be…,” she cringed at the word, one she never thought she’d have to say, “divorced?”  
That was one thing Christine never counted on being. She always knew she’d be married and have children, but divorce? She’d never counted on that. That’s not the kind of thing she planned for in her future.   
Raoul smiled. “I’ve got it all planned out. Ettie and I went down to the courthouse and asked for the paperwork. All you have to do is sign these papers.” Raoul opened his briefcase and pulled out a wad of papers, all of which were filled out besides the places where she had to sign. Something stabbed into her when she saw it, though if it was because of the new nickname he’d given Mariette after one day when he hadn’t called her Little Lotte in eight years or because of the divorce papers she was unsure. “Please do it soon,” he said, bouncing on his heels like an overexcited schoolboy. “I told Ettie I’d meet her for dinner at seven.”   
Christine glared at her soon-to-be ex-husband. “I can’t believe this,” she snarled. “Did these past ten years mean nothing to you? What about Celesta and Madrigal? Do they mean nothing to you?” She pulled her daughters closer to her, trying to prevent their father from even coming near them and breaking their hearts again. “Clearly the three of us don’t mean anything to you. Otherwise you wouldn’t be ruining our family to chase after someone you just met.”  
Celesta looked up at her mother, tears in her eyes. “Maman, why are you so angry?”   
Christine knelt down to look into her daughter’s eyes, resting her hand on the little girl’s shoulder. She softened instantly. “Oh, Celie, Maman’s not angry. Not with you, at least.”   
“Then why are you yelling?” she asked. “You only yell when you’re really really mad. What made you so mad?”  
Christine sighed. Little Celesta was too young to have to go through this. “Your father is leaving us for a girl he just met, that’s why. But don’t you worry about that. That’s for Maman to worry about. Papa will still be part of your life, I promise. He just won’t be part of mine.” Christine stood up and walked over to her desk. “Now, where’s a pen?”   
Raoul reached into his pocket and pulled out a pen. “Here you go, Lotte,” he said. The nickname stung Christine’s ears. He couldn’t call her that. Not now. Not after all he’d done to her. “And I promise you, this will be best for both of us. Now you can go find your soulmate as well. I know how much you used to love the colors. How going to see flowers and other remarkably pigmented things would make you smile even when I couldn’t. This is your chance to see them again,” he said, handing her the pen.   
She shook her head. “I won’t find my soulmate. That I can be almost sure of,” she spat, the words bitter and stinging the air. “But please, just tell me one thing before I sign these papers, since you have color vision now. Please. Then you can go.”   
“Anything.”   
“What color are Celie and Maddie’s eyes? it’s stupid, I know, I just…I need to know.”   
Raoul smiled. “It’s not stupid. It makes sense that their mother would want to see what color her little girls’ eyes are. Celesta, come here, will you?” he asked. The little girl walked up to her father, shuffling her feet across the floor, eyes wide as if she was scared that she’d make him leave too. Christine looked down at the two of them, wishing that was her looking at her daughter’s beautiful eyes. “Blue,” Raoul said, looking up at her. “The most beautiful shade of blue you’ve ever seen, like the rivers you used to beg me to take you to. I don’t know where she got them, but they’re gorgeous.”   
Christine couldn’t fight the smile spreading across her face. “Papa. She got them from my papa. Madame Giry told me that he had the most beautiful blue eyes she’d ever seen. She said they sparkled like the Seine when the sun hit it. And what about Madrigal? What color are her eyes?”  
Raoul looked up at Christine, then back at his little girl. He smiled. “Brown, and always hopeful, just like yours. They’ve got that mischievous, goofy, hopeful shimmer that never leaves. Oh, and they’ve got those little flecks of amber everyone always compliments you on. I’m so glad she’s got your beautiful eyes, Lotte.”   
Christine wanted to snap at him right then and there, tell him not to call her Lotte when all he did was shatter her heart, but she couldn’t break down right in front of her daughters. Not yet. They were too young to see their mother broken like that.   
So instead, she just smiled, as she always did when going through tough times. Smile and force herself through it until she couldn’t bear it anymore, either physically or mentally.  
“Thank you,” Christine said. “I guess I’ll sign the papers now.” She clicked the little ballpoint pen and signed her name everywhere there was a blank on the paper, not even thinking about what she was doing. If she thought about it, she’d back out. She couldn’t do that. That would be taking away Raoul’s happiness, and who was she to take away his happiness?   
Raoul nodded and took the papers. “I guess this is goodbye, then. I’ll see you around.” He then knelt down and hugged Celesta and Madrigal. Celesta then ran back to her mother, understanding her father’s betrayal. “Goodbye, sweet girls. Papa loves you. Never forget that. I’ll see you soon, my princesses.”   
However, Madrigal latched onto her father’s leg, and Christine’s heart sank into her stomach. How was she supposed to explain this to her little Maddie? She didn’t understand. And how was she expected to? She was only five. What did Raoul expect to happen? “Don’t leave me, Papa!” she howled. “You can’t leave me!”   
Raoul pried his daughter’s arms from his leg. “I have to, princess. Maman will take good care of you, and you’re going to see me again soon. I promise. I just have to go see my soulmate.”   
Celesta tilted her head. “Why isn’t Maman your soulmate?” she asked, not budging from her mother’s side. “You spent so long with her. Why are you leaving her now? And why are you leaving us?”  
“Because I found Mariette, and she made my world burst into colors again. You’ll understand one day when your world suddenly becomes colorful. It’s the most amazing feeling in the world, Celie. Now, I’ve got to go. I will see you soon, I promise. Sometime over the weekend, perhaps. Now, come here and give Papa a hug.”   
Celesta didn’t move. “No,” she said. “I won’t hug somebody who’s leaving me in the dust.” Christine stifled a laugh. Her daughter was too similar to her for her own good.   
Christine looked at her daughter. “Celie, hug your father. I don’t know when you’ll see him next.” She sort of spat the last words, though she wasn’t certain if anybody else sensed the venom hidden behind her words.   
Raoul shook his head. “She doesn’t have to hug me if she doesn’t want to. It’s not like it’s a requirement or anything.” He glanced at his watch and his eyes widened. “Well, I really must be going now. It’s half past six, and my Ettie will be waiting at the restaurant at seven. I’ll see you guys around, I guess.”   
With that, Raoul turned and walked out of the door and their lives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. This was fun to write. I'm enjoying this little endeavor into Phantom of the Opera fic writing. Also, Celie and Maddie are the cutest little girls I love them so much.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay! So here's the prologue of Faded! Hope you love it as much as I do!


End file.
